Page 25 of Love & Violence

“Yes. If he can’t have hers, he will take mine,” Domenico said. “We are brother and sister, so we have the same blood in our veins.”

I heard my brother hiss, and then Draven started to choke.

“What are you doing?” I say and try to push my brother away.

“Stop, sister. I’m giving your mate some of my blood. It’ll give him time to get stronger, and then you both have to shift.”

I look up to see Domenico pressing his wrist to my mate’s mouth, and blood trickling out and down his chin, but I can also see some go into his mouth.

I start praying like I never have before.

I feel my mate move, and then he pushes my brother’s arm away from his face.

“Draven, I’m trying to save you,” Domenico says.

“I know. I can feel my strength coming back. Give me a few minutes, and then I’ll try to shift.”

I see someone putting a bandage around my brother’s wrist to stop the bleeding. The group of people stand around us and wait for the miracle I’ve been praying for.

With every passing minute, I can feel life come back into both Draven and myself.

“What are we going to do?” Draven asked Domenico. “Your father will hunt us down again.”

“I’m taking care of it,” Domenico says.

“How?”

My brother sighs. “My father will be dead in the next few hours.”

My eyes widen. “What are you talking about, Dom?”

“I’m going to kill him,” Domenico says with finality.

I swallow a few times, trying to sort through my thoughts and emotions. Would I miss the man that fathered me? Maybe the one from years before when he had some humanity. But he’d lost it, and his soul just got darker as the years passed.

As much as I hate violence, I was glad my brother was going to deal with it. We both deserved a better life than the one we were born into.

Domenico pats Draven’s shoulder. “Do you think you can shift? The sooner, the better.”

“We’ll try.”

I watch as Draven shifts. I can see it takes some effort, but he did it. Laying beside my mate, feeling the healing happen, I hope that things might finally work out for us.

Only time will tell.

Chapter Eight

Psych

I cannot believe that Aryanna’s brother gave me his blood to save my life. I had heard stories, but I never believed in them. It’s like some old wives’ tale you’ve heard a hundred times before and never put any stock in. But now that I have lived through it, I can attest to the fact that it actually works.

I feel my strength return the moment his blood hits my tongue, and shortly after I am able to shift. The magic flows over me, and my panther takes over. My mate lays beside my beast with a brilliant smile before also allowing her cougar to appear. In all my life I have never seen anything as beautiful as she is in this moment.

I have never felt fear like I did in the moments I thought we would both die in that shitty little room. I knew she was feeling my pain, but to see her so fucking broken tore me apart. I felt completely inadequate as a mate, as a man.

Our beasts circle each other, ensuring both are unharmed before we head into the forest. We run through the lush greenery, shoving playfully at one another as we allow the magic to do its work and heal our injuries, inside and out.

For fifteen minutes, we move through the lush foliage before returning to the compound. Aryanna’s cougar shakes its head, trying to stop me, but I need to make sure Domenico follows through on his promise to kill his father. I need to ensure that we are finally free.

---